


It Got Lonely

by punygod



Category: The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-05
Updated: 2013-07-05
Packaged: 2017-12-17 18:57:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/870898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/punygod/pseuds/punygod
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The time Tony wanted to talk about feelings, also known as the time they broke up at 2 o’ clock in the morning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It Got Lonely

Tony couldn’t really blame Steve. After all, he’d only just noticed, hours after he should’ve, that Steve had gone. Living off thirty hours without sleep and a couple of bites of a cold lasagne Steve had brought down for him to eat wasn’t a good enough excuse anymore. He’d known this would happen. He’d predicted it. He was a futurist after all. He just hadn’t thought it would be left up to him to do it.

Tony couldn’t decide where to wait. Should he stay down in the lab? A month ago he could’ve been sure Steve would come looking for him there when he got home. But maybe now his better option of running into him was in the Avengers’ common lounge. Steve had to pass through there to get to their bedroom. Or would the bedroom itself be best? Tony quickly decided against that idea – he didn’t want this conversation to take place where most of his fondest memories had.

So he waited in the lounge, listening for the rumble of Steve’s motorbike he knew he couldn’t hear from seven floors up. He did hear footsteps, though, as they neared the entrance of the room, and Tony steeled himself, closing his eyes and breathing deeply.

He’d left the lights turned off. How melodramatic of him. He preferred to wait in the dark, with only the faint glow of the arc reactor to comfort him, than have the light illuminate the scene that he was already imagining in his head. He briefly thought Steve would be surprised to see him there, waiting, but he hadn’t taken into account Steve’s enhanced sense of hearing, or smell, or slightly increased night vision – as it was, Steve heard the familiar rhythm of Tony’s deep breathing and his dark silhouette on the couch as soon as he reached the lounge.

So it wasn’t surprise that flickered across Steve’s face when he turned the lights on, but curiosity.

“Tony?” he said, walking slowly towards the couch. He had his brown leather jacket over one shoulder, the soles of his shoes thudding against the carpeted floor.

Tony smiled, the best he could muster and patted the seat next to him, gesturing Steve to sit. Steve looked at him for a long hard second before throwing his jacket onto the armchair next to him, and sinking into the couch beside Tony.

Tony smiled again, a little more easily, a little more pained, when he recognised the cologne Steve was wearing. He’d helped him pick it out, one day when he’d dragged Steve shopping. They’d spent an hour loitering in the fragrance section spraying each others wrists and earning frowns of disapproval from the staff. Steve had finally settled on one, more so because Tony had whispered in his ear what he’d do to any man who walked past smelling like that. Steve had blushed crimson and hastily agreed that this was the cologne he preferred. That had been one of their very first dates, way way back in the early stages of their relationships when Tony could still get a rise of pink in Steve’s cheeks with a wink of an eye.

“You didn’t have to wait up for me-” Steve began, maybe just to break the silence that had filled the room.

“I did,” Tony stated calmly, though his mind and heart were starting to speed up. This was it, he was doing it.

“Why?”

“I wanted to talk to you.”

Steve looked at his watch. “Tony, it’s two in the morning. How about we talk later, at a decent hour?”

Tony almost laughed. How the roles had been reversed. Here he was, for once in his life actually trying to talk to Steve about _feelings_ , something he would run a mile and half away from if he had the chance, and Steve was the one pushing it back. Steve who always wanted to talk and work things out, no matter what time of day it was. Steve who was always honest and open and sincere.

“Can we-now?” Tony said, absently grabbing Steve’s wrist. Steve looked at Tony’s hand on his, and then raised his gaze to Tony’s eyes. Tony could tell he knew. He’d probably worked it out the minute he’d stepped into the room. Steve wasn’t stupid, he knew what was coming. Tony just wished it was Steve saying it, instead of him.

‘Okay,” Steve sighed, sinking back into the couch, dragging his wrist out of Tony’s touch.

Thoughts and words were flashing across Tony’s mind. Faster and faster and he knew if he didn’t say it now, he’d never get it out properly.

“I’m sorry.” Steve had to know that. That was the most important thing that Steve needed to know. He never meant for any of this to happen. He’d guessed it might, right at the beginning before they even started seeing each other, when he’d made the mental list of pros and cons. This had definitely been on the cons list, but the more he got to know Steve, the more time he spent thinking about the pros until the cons all but faded away, transforming into senseless doubts of the past.

“You’re not the one who needs to be sorry, Tony,” Steve half whispered.

“I am, Steve,” he reached for Steve’s hand, but then thought better of it, and laid it on his knee. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I did what I promised myself I’d never do. “

He’s bitter. He’s bitter with himself. He hates himself for who he is, for how he’s driven Steve away. Hates that he didn’t have to try, that it happened with him hardly noticing. He yearns for the lost time. All that time that had gone past with his head buried in blueprints and designs. Hours and hours and days without Steve. Time he hadn’t known he’d lost until now.

“You should never have promised yourself that. Tony, building things is what you do. It’s what you love. I shouldn’t be a reason for you to stop doing something you love.”

_You’re what I love._

“You didn’t say anything,” Tony states, not accusing, because none of this was Steve’s fault. But he had to have seen what was happening. He had to have known.

“I tried. Every time I came down and tried, but you were so…captivated - I just couldn’t take you away from something that made you so happy. I didn’t want to force you to spend time with me.”

Tony wanted to say a million things. He had a million excuses which weren’t really excuses, they were truths. He wanted to say that Steve made him happy too. That time with Steve was never forced, it was cherished.

“Why did you go?” he asks instead. It’s unfair to ask. He doesn’t blame him for going, he doesn’t really have a right to. He’d been the one who’d technically gone, always, down to the lab. It wasn’t fair for Steve to wait for the moments when Tony came up for air, the rare occasions Tony remembered dates, or the few times they’d both be in bed at the same time.  

“It got lonely,” and the sadness in Steve’s voice is enough to crush Tony’s heart. It’s enough to create a swirl of words from the cons list, and warnings and lectures from Pepper and Rhodey and Natasha and Barnes, _don’t you dare fuck Steve up._ And Tony wants to apologise, _scream_ apologies at all of them, because they’d expected more from him, and he’d let them down, he’d let himself down, and most importantly, he’d let _Steve_ down.

“I let you down, Tony,” Steve was saying, “I’m sorry I – that I couldn’t be stronger.”

Tony hides a scoff at that. Steve was the strongest man he knew. He carried burden on his shoulders like no one else could, and he’d knocked back despair and distraught as many times as he’d socked Hitler on the jaw. Captain America, the man with enhanced strength, who could lift a dozen girls on a motorcycle over his head, wishing he was stronger. It’s stupid, because Steve isn’t the one that’s supposed to be saying this. He’s stealing Tony’s lines.

“Don’t put this on yourself. Let me take the credit,” and Tony’s almost pleading, and he has to stop himself from pushing himself forward the little distance between them, and taking Steve’s face in his hands.

“Let me take responsibility, for once in my life-“ he waves Steve quiet when he makes to interrupt, “don’t blame yourself because you’ve done nothing but try to make this work, and I’ve been so so oblivious. Some genius, huh?” he adds wryly at the end.

Steve doesn’t smile. He picks at a thread coming lose at the knee of his khakis.

“So is this-“

“I’m glad,” Tony almost chokes out before Steve can finish what Tony knows he’s going to say. Because he still has something to say he hadn’t known he’d wanted to. It wasn’t something he’d prepared to say, it was barely something he’d acknowledged, barely accepted.

“I’m glad you can still be happy with him.”

Steve looks up sharply at that, and shakes his head hurriedly. “It’s not like that. God, Tony, no, it’s not like that at all.”

Tony’s silent.

“Is that what you thought? You thought I’d _cheat?”_ It came out as a hiss, and Steve’s turned fully to face Tony, on the edge of the couch.

Tony feels numb and stupid. Of course Steve wouldn’t cheat.

“I – I’m sorry,” he stammers out. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“Bucky’s just good company. I got-“

“Lonely.”

“Yeah.”

Silence filled the room, and now there was a tension present that Tony had expected to have come earlier. Why had he insisted on doing this at two in the morning? He was suddenly aware of how tired and drained he was. He was too tired to feel anything, his heart and mind exhausted, not finding it in himself to process what had just happened, at the same time knowing all too well exactly what had just happened.

He huffs out a dry laugh, breaking the silence.

“I should get some sleep,” he said, (the first time he admits it, and it’s just an excuse). He hoisted himself off the couch, and then paused, realising that sleep now meant his bed on his own floor. “Good night Steve,” he whispers, not looking at him, his back already turned and walking out into the hallway.

Steve remains on the couch, his elbows resting on his knees, and runs a hand through his hair.

“See you, Tony,” he says softly.  


End file.
